My wife and I were over at church recently for an evangelism meeting. In the course of pre-meeting conversation, time off/days off came into play. I boldly stated (erroneously, I might add) that I take time off. My wife, being one of the greatest accountability partners I have, promptly said out loud something along the lines of "no you don't."
As the conversation continued, she recognized that at times I do take time for myself, but when there are big projects happening, I do a very poor job of this. For example, when we were developing the new website for the church, I spent every possible moment writing code, playing with widgets, testing applications, etc. I worked on it during the day, before dinner, after dinner, on days off...you get the point. I was completely engulfed in the project at the expense of time with my family.
My wife, as usual, was very right. I do not always do a very good job of taking care of myself (or them) by taking my days off as days off. Sometimes this is difficult to do because we live in the parsonage (basically in the church parking lot) and when you live that close to the church, it can be difficult some days to get away from "work".
It can also be difficult because as pastors, some of what we do we consider 'volunteer' work for the church. In other words, if we had another job, we would still be doing some of the things for the church that we are doing, even if we were not on staff. So pastorally speaking, it can be blurry what is volunteer ministry and what is 'work' related ministry (I am still not convinced that there is a clear line). Additionally, I have spent the last 3 years working on my Mdiv degree and taking 12 hours in the spring and 12 in the fall. This is insane I know, but going to school full time, pastoring two churches, and having a family is tough to do with only 24 hours in the day. Unfortunately, with most of the folks that I know, family is always (just as in my case) what seems to suffer the most.
Well, part of doing good has to be doing good towards our families (going back to the living the General Rules). So in an effort to correct this in my life, my wife and I made plans for time in Dallas last weekend (we went in to be with our friend Stacey and her girls...her hubby was out of town on a mission trip) and this weekend we are going to go to the lake with my folks on Saturday.
I have to admit, when I run so hard that I run around my family, I am the one missing out. Not to mention that it is nice to unplug occasionally and just be. Taking time off and away this past week has reminded me just how important it is to me, my family and my ministry.
My future plans for doing good regarding the family (or an application of doing no harm and doing good) is as follows:
1) take my days off as a days off
2) except on nights where there are unavoidable church meetings, spend the hours between 5:30 and 8:00 p.m. with them (if there is something that absolutely has to be done, do it after Bailey has gone to bed and I have hung out with her and Erica).
3) Find babysitters and get back into a regular pattern of date night on Friday evenings
4) Start planning the family camping trip for November
5) continue to be in the cooking rotation (more about this in another post)
I would love to hear how you are balancing family, ministry, work, etc in your life!
Peace,
Russell
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The first think I told my S/PRC when we got to this charge was that Friday evening was Date Night. Unless someone was really sick or dying (emergencies), date night was my priority. After all, if they want we to take care of them, they have to help me take care of me.
Beth and I always have date night. We decided to do that while we were still engaged. If something comes up that night, we always reschedule.
For personal physical health, I make sure to get 1-2 hours of lifting and running, six days a week. I'm happier and more productive when I'm fit, so I make sure that happens.
Most importantly, I've dropped out of the race. In other words, after my first semester, I came to the conclusion that I'll get done whith school when I get done. I'm already serving a church--what God's called me to do. So I'm in no hurry to get done with school. The culture tells us fast is good, over-working ourselves is a virtue, saying "no" to something is a sin, etc. Education, family, and church are worth my time and energy; trying to do everything and more as well as trying to get it all done as fast as possible is not.
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